Foreign hackers are hijacking social media accounts in Taiwan to spread disinformation aimed at damaging the reputation of the armed forces, the Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau (MJIB) said yesterday.
The newly identified cyberoperatives hacked into devices connected to the Internet, such as surveillance cameras and facial recognition systems, to gain access to social media accounts on the forum Dcard and the Professional Technology Temple (PTT) bulletin board system, the bureau said in a news release.
China-linked hackers impersonating Taiwanese air force pilots have used the accounts to write posts about alleged poor pay and working conditions in the military, it said.
Photo: Reuters
One post said that many pilots were willing to face NT$3 million (US$92,914) in financial losses rather than renew their military contracts, while another said that the author was leaving the military for the civilian sector to have more time with their family, the bureau said.
On PTT, an account named “ss900287” amplified the messages by posting a link to a photograph purportedly showing a list of retired military pilots applying for jobs at China Airlines Ltd (中華航空), it said.
The Air Force Command’s efforts to debunk the fake stories have been met with a surge of similar posts on 170 abnormal Facebook groups, including “The Strait Today” (今日海峽), “Commentary by the Commander” (提督) and “You Ban, Me Mad” (你下架我狂), it said.
Chinese hackers have targeted facial recognition systems, digital cameras and other network devices to obtain personal data, which they have used to steal social media accounts, the bureau said, citing an investigation by its cybersecurity unit.
Assuming the identity of genuine users has allowed Beijing to enhance the apparent authenticity of the disinformation, it said.
The external forces responsible for the disinformation campaign used data de-identification techniques and rerouted their activity to mask their identities and location, the bureau said.
Social media platforms were notified and asked to ban the groups and users connected to the incidents, it said.
Taiwanese should enhance the security of networked devices and protect their accounts by using strong passwords and regularly updating them, it said.
In other news, fishers in Penghu County reported spotting a flotilla of Chinese fishing boats using fake Taiwanese radar transponder codes in waters southwest of the county’s Cimei Township (七美).
The boats pinged as Taiwanese vessels on radar, but upon visual inspection were clearly identified as being of Chinese origin, sources said.
Chinese fishing boats can be identified by their black hull paint and illegal vessels would be expelled upon detection, the Coast Guard Administration said.
The reason for the Chinese boats disguising their transponder code is not known, the agency added.
Additional reporting by Liu Yu-ching and CNA
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
A former television news host and six military personnel — active and retired — have been indicted on espionage charges, Kaohsiung prosecutors said yesterday. Lin Chen-you (林宸佑), a former CTi News host and YouTuber, last year allegedly made videos at the direction of a Chinese agent criticizing the Democratic Progressive Party’s recall campaign, the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office told a news conference in Kaohsiung. He allegedly received 4,325 tether coins for the videos from an unidentified person surnamed Huang (黃), believed to be an agent of a hostile foreign power, they said. Lin, also known as Ma Te (馬德), has a show named
RSS